monique.p.author@gmail.com

Posts tagged ‘#booklover’

As a blogger and HUGE fan of books I find this to be a disgusting misuse of power. Some bloggers actually do make a living giving HONEST reviews of upcoming and newly released books.
I love to read and when I read a book that speaks to me I want to share that with the reading community. So many of the best books I’ve read have been either A. a recommendation from a fellow reader or B. a new release from an author I “know” since I “follow” them on social media waiting with baited breathe for them to give me a new book to devour.
Do we “know” these authors we follow? We’d like to think so, but in all honestly we usually do not. We often know them by pen names, social media presence and what small details of their lives they share with their fans. I “know” Stevie J. Cole and Audrey Carlan as much as I “know” Barry Manilow (and I have been able to tell you everything there is to know about Barry since I was 8 years old, I touched him in 1996 and got a “personal” letter from him in the 80s).
Whether I am reviewing one of these authors’ books or Barry’s newest compilation album it’s an honest review of what I thought and why I thought it. How much I stalk a person on social media doesn’t change my tastes in books (or music and yes I realize I’m very uncool and I’m okay with that).
Amazon not only taking away years of reviews but disregarding the reviewer’s concerns about why this was done is just one example of how they have gotten too big for their britches. Readers who care pour their hearts out in reviews and carefully select their words to properly convey exactly what and why they like or do not like a book. We readers are passionate and to disregard hours of honest reviews about books that have touched us, changed us, and moved us is disrespectful and belittling.
What links do we usually share to fellow readers so they too may enjoy these books? Amazon.com of course. They are the behemoth of the book buying universe.
I am disgusting for my fellow blogger and saddened because these kinds of actions from a book source so many of us send chunks or our paychecks to leave us to wonder how we fight back. Do we let them win and pay the higher dollar at other retailers, go without our e-books and stop sharing our best loved books with others or let them win by allowing this treatment to go on unfettered without altering our spending habits?
You will find one thing to be true 99.9% of the time: readers are passionate about their books and about their opinions of the books they like, love, and hate.
To erase a passionate reader’s voice without so much as a conversation is vile and rude and no matter how big and powerful you are neither of those things will ever be acceptable.
My fellow bloggers and reviewers, somehow we must address and resolve this injustice.

It’s taken me a bit of time to write this post, but I figured it’s about time to share the utter nonsense that’s happened between me and Amazon, and how a company that I once highly respected, has now become one that I have zero respect for.

I’ve thought about writing this post for weeks, what I would say and how I would capture everything that’s happened, and I’ll be honest with the fact that this post has taken on many forms, but finally I decided that it would just be easiest to state the facts.

So here it goes…

As some of you know, on February 24th I was sent an email from Amazon letting me know that I could no longer post reviews on their website, and that all of my previous reviews had been suppressed or removed. In case you’re wondering, that was well over 300…